Thunderstorms
by bamboo-bones
Summary: Without Light, the world is black. A Takari oneshot. Enjoy.


**Oh my.  
Hello!  
This is my second published story.  
My first one got deleted because it was a songfic.  
Oops.  
Oh well.**

**Standard disclaimers apply.**

* * *

He rejected her.

He flat out rejected her.

It wasn't even Kari's fault. All she did was tell him that she was in love with him. Not a big deal. Smooth sailing. But that wasn't the point. She thought T.K. loved her back.

* * *

The Sakura tree was blossoming. The flowers were slowly losing their petals as the breeze took them off the tree. It rained pink. They went everywhere; onto the grass, in the occasional walker's hair, onto the pathway. It was the same everyday. Kari and T.K. would go to their tree and talk. They would smile and laugh about their day. If one of them were sick, the other would still go. It was their routine. It was their time together. They've been best friends since they met at the age of eight. It was right here, under this tree, they decided to be best friends forever. Now, it was all ruined.

"T.K., can we talk?" She suddenly got nervous. Before he could ask him to sit down, _she_ was the one that had her legs buckle under her.

"Kari, we're already-hey, be careful!" He caught her before she could fully fall.

"Well, yeah, I know that, but I mean… oh, never mind!" She was trying to move away but he wouldn't allow it.

"Kari," he sat down carefully beside her, still holding her tight in his arms, "I know that you're going to say something, and if you don't you're going to keep thinking about it and regret that you didn't say it when you did, so just te-"

He was cut off by her lips pressing on his. It lasted only a few seconds, but by the time he could realize what his best friend was doing, he was tensing up. All he could think of was to either return the kiss, or run.

He chose the latter.

Pushing her away, pulling her arms from his neck, he left her there under their Sakura tree. He was running away. He didn't know where, but T.K. had to go somewhere. He couldn't take this. He ended up at home.

The regret set in far too soon. Once he shut the door to his room, he ran to his bed, lying face-down on it, slowly beginning to sob.

_I screwed up, didn't I? She probably hates me now! Why did I have to run from her? I should have told her then and there. Oh, I'm so stupid!_

Then the sun hid behind the clouds.

It started to rain.

No. Never mind that.

It started to thunderstorm.

* * *

T.K. tried to talk to Kari the next morning. The rain hadn't let up. Walking by her apartment, he saw her leave.

She definitely wasn't herself.

Instead of her usual pink, cheerful attire, she was dressed completely in black. Her natural looking face was pale, and her eyes were lined in dark colours. She hadn't bothered with an umbrella; simply wearing a dark hooded sweater seemed to work for her.

"Kari?"

She simply turned to face him. Kari had tears rolling down her face. Her new makeup was spilling down her face, in two, identical streaks. Swiftly bringing her head back to face the path before her, she kept on walking. She didn't even attempt to wipe her tears, or adjust her makeup. She simply kept moving forward.

The rejection hadn't only hurt her outer appearance.

In her first class, that she happened to have with T.K. and Davis, she kept her hair between her best friend's face and hers. Everyone was wondering what had happened to her. What made her snap into her darker side? One person knew. Another enjoyed her new self.

"Wow," Davis began, when he saw her for the first time, "What the hell happened to you? I love it!" He seemed to enjoy the darker Kari.

_She's so dark. It's so adorable! A tortured soul, all for me! But, why isn't T.K. wondering what's wrong?_

All T.K. could think was one thing.

_I'm so, so sorry._

English class, which Kari and T.K. also had together, hadn't gone by fifteen minutes when all Hell broke loose. Kari was sitting backwards on her chair, her blackened shoes on the desk in front of her, throwing papers towards the blackboard. She tossed one, and it hit their teacher square in the back of his head. This made him snap.

"Miss Kamiya, is there a problem?" He said, emphasizing the last word, while cracking the chalk in his hand.

More like shattering it in his hand.

"No, Mr. Teacher, sir." She replied with a certain smirk. She threw another crumpled paper at his head, this time at the vein popping on his forehead.

The entire class gasped at the events that unfolded. A few giggled under their breath. One flipped.

"Kari, please!" her friend stood and went to face her. "Do you have any idea what you're doing? Stop, before you get into any more trouble!"

"Now, why would I want to do that?"

She crumpled another paper in her hand. Before he could protest, he left his mouth hanging open, dumbfounded by his crush's new personality. The crumpled paper slowly made its way into his mouth.

"Hikari Kamiya, get to the office! That's a full week of detention for you!"

"Ooh, detention, fun! It's not like I have anything better to do, Mr. Teacher, sir." She grabbed her bag and made her way towards the door.

Kari walked through her door flaming at anything that got in her way. Tai was unfortunately in her path.

"Get out of my way, brat." She cried out to him.

More like 'screamed in his face while fuming' at him.

"Kari, what the hell, why are you home early? And what's with the black?"

Tai was suddenly furious. He had one sick day this semester, and his sister had to come home early. On top of that, she definitely wasn't herself. When he heard the door to her room slam behind her, the 'over-protective brother' instinct gave in. He went over to the threshold of her room. He knocked. No answer.

"Kari?"

No answer.

"Kari, I'm serious, open the door." This time, he got an answer. Kari was sobbing. Slowly he opened the door.

"He rejected me, Tai."

"Who did what?"

"T.K.! I told him everything in one moment and he ran from me!"

Tai, instead, was fuming. "He did this to you? Why the hell would he do this to you? I trusted him! He's such a little ba-"

"Tai, please! Don't say things like that about him." She had stopped sobbing into her pillow and moved towards her mirror. "Look at me, look at what I've become! I even got sent home for the rest of today because of him, and I have detention for the rest of this week. It's pointless. Why did I even try? I should have listened to him!"

"Kari, I'm your brother, and I'm going to make this right." He suddenly got an idea. "I'll be right back, okay?" He left her room and went towards the phone, dialing T.K.'s number.

Kari wasn't the only one in pain. She had lost her light, and T.K. had lost his hope. He was in his room, looking at the sky through his window. The rain was still going on, as the thunder and lightning was getting worse by the hour. He started sobbing, thinking of how much he had regretted ever leaving her.

_I wish there was some way I could tell you how sorry I am, Hikari. I've lost my light, now I'm losing my hope. I want to tell you that I-I love y-you, but I can't even face you because you won't let me._

The phone in the kitchen started to ring.

_Is that her? Please, please, please let it be her!_

He noticed the name on his caller ID.

_Kamiya._

_Oh, yes! Now I can apologize, at least she wants to talk again, right?_

He answered the phone on the second ring.

"Kari? I'm sorry! I'm so glad you called! Please, don't hang up just listen to what I have to say. Kari, I lo-"

He was cut off by a male's voice.

"No, YOU listen to what I have to say, you bastard." Tai was screaming into the phone on his end. "You made Kari this way, now you're going to change her back. You are coming over here, you are apologizing, and you are going to make her smile! Damn it, she's crying her eyes out and it's your fault. Now you had better get over here this instant or else I'll be the one dragging you over here for you!"

The line went dead.

T.K. knew what he had to do. He shut the door behind him and scurried over to her apartment.

Wait, no.

He ran over to her apartment.

No, even better.

He sped over to her apartment with all his might.

Yeah, that's better.

"Kari, you have a visitor."

Three knocks on her door followed by the sound of an opening door.

"Kari?" A pillow was thrown at him. "Kari, listen to me! Please?"

"What makes you think I would ever want to talk to you?" Kari's sobs had stopped.

"Look, I'm here to apolo-"

"I don't want to hear any of it."

"Well, you're going to. Just let me talk, and then you can yell at me all you want. Kari, I'm so, so sorry that I did this to you. I never meant to hurt you at all. You caught me by surprise that day, and I just want to say, that, it was wrong and stupid of me to do that. I didn't even want to run from you that day! I wanted to hold you even closer to me and kiss you back, but I didn't. I got scared, I got nervous! I'm so sorry, and, you can hate me forever if you want."

Silence overcame them. He was the one to break it.

"Do you know why I love thunderstorms? Because, well, I've always thought that Love is like a thunderstorm; electricity and sparks connecting earth and sky. If I am the earth, I want you to be my sky, and the lightning to be our love that connects us, because I love you, Kari Kamiya. I really do."

Her head turned towards his.

"Takeru?"

"Yes, Hikari?"

"I love you too."

Suddenly he was the one kissing her. Neither of them ran, because the only place they wanted to be was in the other's arms. It wasn't their first kiss, and it definitely wasn't their last.

The sun finally came out, and the rain had stopped.

Light and hope intertwined, becoming one.


End file.
